International students below PhD level may be prohibited from bringing families to the UK

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has vowed to cut net migration. Photo: Getty Images Europe/Leon Neal

All international university students on courses Under plans being considered by the government, it will be prohibited to bring family members to the UK below PhD level.

The move would mean that more than 100,000 dependents are now brought to the UK by international students for master's degrees, MBA and other postgraduate courses have been blocked.

Ministers believe the ban will instantly reduce immigration, ending what they claim was an abuse that helped drive net migration to record levels.

< p>The figures, due later this week, are expected to show that net migration hit a record high last year, with the total projected to be between 700,000 and one million people.

Sunak «considers a number of options»

On Sunday, Rishi Sunak vowed to take measures to reduce net migration, with announcements coming «soon,» although government sources downplayed the chances of the package being unveiled this week. . "I am considering a number of options to bring the numbers down" he said at a meeting of G7 leaders in Tokyo.

«But let me be clear that the number of legal migrants in the future is too high, and I intend, and the government intends to reduce these numbers.»

Number of dependents boosted The number of international students in the UK has risen ten-fold from 12,800 in 2018 to 135,788 last year amid evidence obtained by The Telegraph that low-skilled Indians are using spouse student visas to come and work in the UK.< /p>

Students have described how they use the visa scheme to bring their less educated spouses to the UK as a workaround. They are assisted by agents in India who advertise how they can get dependent visas for their spouses in a matter of days without even requiring them to have an English language test certificate.

One graduate student studying at the University of Central Lancashire said: “My husband dropped out of college in India. Our family has decided to invest in my postgraduate study in the UK so that I can take it with me. He works as a sales manager at a grocery store and we make good money.»

Rohit Sharma, a Punjab worker seeking to come to the UK, told The Telegraph: «My dependent visa to Canada and the US was rejected . So I sent my wife to graduate school in the UK, which helped me quickly get a dependent visa.”

Dependency attack

Agents in India promote their services on social media. One advertisement for Visa Planet Education consultants said: “Study in the UK. Spouses may agree with or without IELTS. Apply for enrollment in September.”

Another Facebook post for Success Overseas Education Consultancy states: “UK dependent visa approved in just six days. Study in the UK without IELTS [International English Language Testing System].”

Apparently, ministers have agreed to prevent graduate students from being targeted for dependency harassment because of the value of their research on major projects as well as student education. Last year, PhDs accounted for just five percent of all postgraduate visas.

However, while Gillian Keegan, the secretary of education, wants to limit restrictions on dependents of international students to a one-year master's degree, Swella Braverman, the home secretary, is supposed to want to go further.

The source suggested he would close to covering all postgraduate courses below the PhD level, including over two years. There have been speculations that there could be restrictions on «low-quality» courses, but such moves have proven problematic due to the difficulty of defining them without a lawsuit from universities.

On Sunday, speaking to the Migration Data Network, the Minister of the Environment Teresa Coffey denied on Wednesday that the ministers had lost control of the number of people entering the country.

"Our universities are very interested in having people come from all over the world. We also see it as a great way to potentially attract talent,” she said.

"If it's easier to go to study in the USA or somewhere else, at the same time, while we have, I think, these are four of the 10 best universities in the world according to international rankings, this is extremely important, so that we try to make sure that people have access to this perfection."